"I don't sing any other version but "Black Girl" and, yes, I have sang it that way in front of black people and, no, I don't feel self-conscious about it. I also sing "Black Betty" which I use as an a capella interlude for Hooker's "Roll and Roll" and, again, have done this many times in front of black patrons and listeners. One time I broke into "Black Betty" and a young black woman standing on the corner with her daughter began to bob up and down to it in a way that told me she knew the song well."


Well there's a big difference between the lyrics of "Black Betty" and "Black Girl"!!

I guess I should be glad that there are places where you live where racism is such a thing of the past that a white singer can sing the words of a black man menacingly interrogating a black woman about her faithfulness without it making the atmosphere remotely uneasy.

I guess the America I read about and hear about is very different from the truth. There isn't anywhere like that here in London.

The places where I play, I'd get heckled ("white boy, white boy..." perhaps!) By my friends, at the very least!

Actually, uneasiness of atmosphere aside, I would just think it a bit naff. The fact that when I introduce the song (describing the prospect of me, a white middle-class bloke, singing the black working-class Leadbelly's sinister inquisition as "black girl") and get *laughs* from black (and white) members of the audience tells me absolutely everything I need to know.